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Bell Jar


[Once upon a time, in a faraway land, a young prince lived in a shining castle.]

Not so much a castle as a fortress; a single floor of rooms, all the same save but one, his home, consisting of a small bed, a table and chair and objects to study, pens that could inflict no harm to write with, paper that could not be hidden from the prying eyes in every corner. This room was large, filled with books on bolted shelves, screens on walls and tapes to watch and re-watch, full of images to infiltrate his mind, so he would forget his outside world. By the time he realized that his castle was not a castle but a prison, it was too late, and the thought was quickly forgotten.

But much like a prince. Treated with respect by those of higher authority, sneered upon by those of less stature. He had a father, a commander who he never saw, one who always watched his duels and battles from the shadows, mouthing words to figures cloaked in suits and shadows and a keeper who watched over him, protected him and in secret taught him morality, which was not allowed.

[Although he had everything his heart desired, the prince was spoiled, selfish, and unkind.]

His heart was the one thing that could never be filled, though he had the material things he needed; he longed for a view outside the fortress, and his longing made him bitter. He performed his tasks, molded his identities to compensate for those not of his nature; some of those were spoiled, selfish and unkind. Through the eyes and words and actions of others, he was cruel. A racist, a murderer, a rapist, a thief, but to himself he was no one, for he didn’t even have a mirror to see his own reflection. The prince didn’t know the color of his eyes.

[But then, one winter's night, an old beggar woman came to the castle and offered him a single rose in return for shelter from the bitter cold.]

The beggar woman was not haggard by appearance, but her soul hung low and her smile never reached her eyes when she spoke to him. It was as if she were the only person who could see through him, the only one who recognized that he wasn’t really there. He had no soul for he had never learned loss; he had no heart for he had never known love. The beggar woman, dressed in floral prints and perfume, extended to him a single rose, in hopes that he could keep it safe, and that in some way ease her soul.

[Repulsed by her haggard appearance, the prince sneered at the gift and turned the old woman away, but she warned him not to be deceived by appearances, for beauty is found within.]

But the prince was wary. In his years of solitude, he had no freedom, for he’d never known trust. He did not trust his father and knew his keeper did not trust him. The rose with no name appeared too beautiful, too precious to be tended by him, and in his distrust, turned the beggar away, and ignored the rose for years and years, taking its constant presence and accessibility for granted.

[And when he dismissed her again, the old woman's ugliness melted away to reveal a beautiful enchantress.]

The beggar died, suddenly, and in her place appeared Beauty, the rose, whose heart had become stone by the loss of her protector, and bitter by the denial of her friend. She dawned a silver hammer and thorny heels and masked her crystal eyes -once full of love as red as the petals she’d once been- with a shield of chains, locked together to form a barrier against all who tried to pass. The sad, soul-weary beggar had been replaced by an enchantress.

[The prince tried to apologize, but it was too late, for she had seen that there was no love in his heart, and as punishment, she transformed him into a hideous beast, and placed a powerful spell on the castle, and all who lived there.]

The prince tried to apologize to the enchantress, the rose, the Beauty, but she wouldn’t hear him, did not believe him. He went so far as to venture once outside his fortress to bring her a rose, must like she had been, but an actual rose, one of down petals and silk highlights and a velvet stem, but she dropped it on the ground and killed it with her heels.

He cried out for her in his sleep after she had gone, but she never answered. He saw her in the hallways, between his dungeon and his study and he reached for her, but she turned away. Slowly, the rejection he’d shown her reflected back and poured into him. It seeped under his skin and into his eyes. As he grew, it became more and more apparent, and the distance between himself and normalcy, what little there was in his fortress, became greater and greater. And in his distance from her, he surpassed those before him and raised the bar for those to come, so high that he was no longer viewed human. He was an experiment, a small toy to test the limits of, to push harder and harder to see how long it would take before he cracked. He howled pain at their tortures until his cries were animal, and he became a Beast.

A spell fell over the palace. The hallways that had once been filled with laughter by the same voice now sparked fear and resentment. Her thorns clicked on the tile as she walked, an air of confidence that rained superiority and concealed deterioration wafted down the corridors and permeated every crack.

[Ashamed of his monstrous form, the beast concealed himself inside his castle, with a magic mirror as his only window to the outside world.]

He knew of their proceedings for years. He knew his books were burned and his advice reversed and his warnings unheeded. But he was frightened of the outside world, and refused to leave the comfort of his fortress and the longing for his Beauty. And even when he finally did leave and brave his handsome façade to the outside world, he concealed the Beast from everyone, and kept his ties with his keeper, his father and his rose.

From the centre of it all, he watched the world through a two-way mirror, looking out and seeing what revolved around him, yet not around him, and participated, yet was not involved. He had nothing to do with the outside world, and could only watch it through his mirror as it passed him by, year by year by year…

[The rose she had offered was truly an enchanted rose, which would bloom until his twenty-first year.]

And as those years went by, the rose, Beauty, continued to grow: colder, harder, further and further away, suffocating in her own silk and dying inside the glass dome placed over her to keep her safe. The father, protective; of her, or of the truth? placed it over her head and confined her in the dungeon of the castle, tying her fate to the Beast’s.

[If he could learn to love another, and earn her love in return by the time the last petal fell, then the spell would be broken.]

If he could learn to walk away, to survive, without the emotional umbilical that connected him to his solitude, his keeper and his rose, then she could leave, or if she could magically lure him back inside, away from the drivels of the outside world, then, and only then would her father release her.

But the beast could not. He tried to love, tried to trust, but his inexperience and own betrayals made it impossible. And in his own damnation condemned the only source of Beauty in his life to death.

[If not, he would be doomed to remain a beast for all time.]

Forever and ever and ever- the legacy would pass from him, to his children, his children’s children, his children’s grandchildren, and on, until one of them could learn to love, and, more importantly, be loved in return, with all that it entails. And the legacy would continue, with no doubt, for he’d lost his only chance at love when he pushed away the beggar. Regret would eat at his heart as he stared into the eyes of Beauty, every part of him aching for what was destroyed. By himself, no less. She may have named him, but he saw himself the Beast.

[As the years passed, he fell into despair, and lost all hope, for who could ever learn to love a beast...]

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